In Passive Voice with contrast to Active Voice, the performer
of the action is unclear, though the owner of the action performed could be specified. For example
"Mary's car is washed." tells us that Mary have a car and someone - not Mary - washes it. The
Passive Voice can be used in every tense, so for simplicity in this mini lesson I will use
the Present Tense, as in my example above.
In English we simply use "to be" + past tense of the verb, e.g. "is washed". In Turkish, there are three
basic cases, all depending on the last sound of the verb root.
The verb root ends in vowel: - the suffix is "n" -> oku(-mak) (to read) -> oku-n-mak (to be read)
The verb root ends in "l" : - the suffix varies depending on the table below -> sil(-mek) (to erase) -> sil-in-mek (to be erased)
| Last vowel of verb root | a/ı | e/i | o/u | ö/ü |
|---|
| Suffix | -ın | -in | -un | -ün |
The verb root ends in another consonant - the suffix varies depending on the table below -> tut(-mak) (to hold) -> tut-ul-mak (to be held)
| Last vowel of verb root | a/ı | e/i | o/u | ö/ü |
|---|
| Suffix | -ıl | -il | -ul | -ül |
Passive Voice suffix remains unchanged when the tense changes, for example:
tutulmak (to be held) - tutuldu (was held)